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Join the Debate on Health Care Economics

March 8, 2012

Two experts in health care economics will debate ways to control health care costs at a March 14 event at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy.

The talk, “What’s the Best Way to Provide Americans Affordable, High-Quality Health Care?” will be held at 7:30 p.m. in Sanford’s Fleishman Commons. The event is free and open to the public. Parking is available in the Bryan Center parking garage.

Don Taylor, an associate professor of public policy at Duke, and Duke alumnus James Capretta MPP'87, associate director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) during the Bush administration, will discuss different strategies to bend the curve of rising costs. Christopher Wolfe, co-director of the Thomas International Center, will moderate.

“Health care is the biggest driver of the long-term budget deficit, especially 20 to 50 years in the future,” said Taylor, whose research focuses on long-term care, health care policy and comparative health systems.

Taylor wrote a series of 29 columns for The (Raleigh) News & Observer about health care reform and currently blogs about health care policy at TheIncidentalEconomist.com. Last fall, he wrote and published an e-book, “Balancing the Budget is a Progressive Priority.”

Capretta is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. As the associate director of the White House OMB from 2001 to 2004, he was responsible for health care, Social Security, education and welfare programs. He is co-author of “Why Obamacare is Wrong for America,” published last year. His essays and articles have appeared in numerous publications.

The event is part of the school’s series, “Gridlock: Can Our System Address America's Big Problems?” It is sponsored by the Sanford School of Public Policy and co-sponsored by the Thomas International Center and the Intercollegiate Studies Institute.